I plan on updating here what is happening in our lawn/garden/flower beds. Every year I have taken some pictures to help me remember what is what and which plants are flowers vs. weeds but then I loose the picture so I'm putting some thoughts here so that I don't lose them. Nothing disappears from the internet, folks. Remember that.
So a quick tour of the yard is in order. Starting in our backyard, you might start by eating dinner on the patio and then look to the left and see this:
 |
| Lots of different kinds of hostas. I think they need to be divided again, because this area seems very crowded. There are also lots of forget-me-nots but I don't really like them and I should pull them out next year. |
Next up is the garden. It's looking great!! We have pumpkins, spinach, carrots, beans, peas, onions, and kohlrabi (I think that's what is growing there, it may be weeds) growing from seed. Then I bought eight tomato plants (six are beefsteak & roma for canning) and four pepper plants because I can never get those to work well from seeds. We were gone last weekend and everything jumped out of the ground and it looks like I'm a gardener!!! The jury is still out as to whether or not I will have to put a fence around this to prevent veggie loss.
In the back of the house we have something interesting going on: A large row of hostas. They aren't placed along the fence, but about 8 feet in so there is a bare spot behind them full of crazy weeds. We're just leaving it. Someday maybe we'll get some more bushes or trees for back here and I can make it look more intentional, and disguise our view into our neighbor's house a little better.
 |
| What to do with this strange space back here? Bushes? Trees? Chicken coop? |
Next up on our stroll around the house is our side yard. It's really bad looking. I've given up hope that it will look good this year. We stuck down those square pavers under the garbage cans and called it a big improvement. TaDa!
 |
| Weeds, hostas (again!), rose bush climbing a strange trellis |
By the way, our lawn has really gotten away from us at the moment. It's pretty comical to me, actually, because there is a distinct line between our neighbors yards and our yard in regards to the millions of dandelions we have popping up. I'm unwilling to spray them this year though because we have a little boy who literally puts grass in his mouth yet. So all our neighbors probably think we are the shame of the neighborhood, and I don't care. Not a priority to us!
On the front of that corner is this cool climbing flowering plant. I love it because there are always hummingbirds here. I might try and install some sort of trellis in front of the garbage cans to help hide them and this will grow beautifully on it.
 |
| Slowly training this to climb across the top of the garage. I cut some off when I thought it was dead but it turns out I shouldn't have cut it. Whoops! |
Around the front of the house is this crazy, curly, ugly bush. We're trying to embrace it. We have a whole stack of mulch and weed barrier that I AM GOING TO GET IN THIS YEAR so that all the weeds will be gone and pretty black mulch will be here instead. Along the right side is a new hydrangea plant that will be my favorite thing, I think.
 |
| Pride of the neighborhood |
Farther to the left, my in-laws recently bought us that crab-apple tree to replace the dead olive tree that we cut down last year. It's my son's birthday gift, and I'm excited to take his picture in front of it every year to document both of their growth.
 |
| Needs to be weeded |
Along the other side of the yard is another mess. I started weeding and mulching this sucker and got about 1/2 of the way along the house before my wrists started acting up so then the weeds crept back in along the other half before we finished it. The right side looks lovely, but I'm hoping to finish off the other half (to the left of the A/C) this year and then along the fence another year. It's just too much for me.
 |
| Where we sttarted |
 |
| I will finish the stone border along here at some point. |
 |
| Wild! Full of lots of bulb type plants, purple round flowers, tall grass, and weeds. And Creeping Jenny. Lots of creeping jenny. |
Thus concludes our tour of the yard. I hope you are still with me and I didn't bore you to death, and that my weeds didn't burn your eyes! I'll post another update farther along into the summer to see how much improvement has been made. Will she get the mulch in?? Are those kohlrabi plants or just weeds?? Will the neighbors start collecting their torches and pitchforks??? Stay tuned to find out!
